The Appropriate Way to Use Incense while Praying at Home
Q: What is the appropriate way for laypeople to use incense in
prayer?
A: Historically, it has probably been
exceptional for a laymen to use incense at home, because of the expense
involved, and so it should not be thought that this is essential, but it
certainly is permissible.
A laymen
would only use a hand censer – not a swinging censer like the clergy typically
use.
When a
person censes with a hand censer, the censer is held in the right hand, and the
sign of the cross is made with the censer over whatever he is censing. Then the censer is placed in the left hand,
and he makes the sign of the cross and bows… unless he is censing other people,
in which case he makes the sign of the cross with the censer only, and then
bows to the people without signing himself.
If you
are doing morning or evening prayers, you could cense before the beginning of
the prayer, though some do this at the end.
It is a
nice touch to have a Cross and Gospel in your icon corner. This is where your
censing would begin and end. You could just cense the icons in the icon corner,
but if you wanted to, you could cense the whole room you are praying in, or
other rooms too, if you wish.
There is
more on the practical questions of how to use a censer if you are doing other
reader services, at home or in a Church (in the absence of a priest) in
"Practical Questions On How To Do Reader Services."
On a
practical note, in addition to a good hand censer, you will want to have a pair
of tongs to light the coals – though chopsticks work even better, if you know
how to use them. Chopsticks also have the added benefit of allowing you to
place pieces of incense exactly where you want them.
I came
across an article, which has the following comments on the use of a hand
censer, which probably at least reflects pious Greek custom:
"Earlier
we mentioned the hand censer as part of the icon corner. This hand censer is
used in the home on eves of feasts, Saturday evenings, the beginnings of lenten
periods, on the eves of name's days of the family, on the eve of the patron of
the family church, and on other occasions. Some Orthodox families use the hand
censer each evening at family prayer, but the minimum use of it is for the
above-mentioned occasions.
The
offering of incense to God is a practice which dates back to the time of Moses
when God gave commands as to how to burn it.
You shall
make an altar to burn incense upon ... And Aaron shall burn fragrant incense on
it; every morning when he dresses the lamps he shall burn it, and when Aaron
sets up the lamps in the evening, he shall burn it, a perpetual incense before
the Lord throughout your generations. You shall offer no unholy incense thereon
(Ex. 30:1, 7-9).
The
burning of incense as an offering to God will continue even to the end of the
world, as revealed by God to St. John.
And
another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer; and he was
given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden
altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of
the saints from the hand of the angel before God (Rev. 8:3- 5).
Because
of the command and revelation of God regarding the offering of incense, the
Church uses incense as an acceptable offering in its Divine Services. Since the
parish church uses incense, so should the family church use incense as an
offering pleasing to God. On Saturday evenings, on the eves of feasts and the
other already-mentioned occasions, the house is "blessed" with
incense. The head of the household carries the hand censer with burning incense
throughout the entire dwelling (basement and attic included) and makes the sign
of the Cross on the four walls of each room and over the beds. Some Orthodox
have the custom of saying with each sign of the Cross thus made: "This
room (or bed) is blessed by the sign of the Holy Cross." The person censing
is accompanied by all members of the household chanting "Holy
God...," the troparion of the feast or Sunday or other appropriate ode,
and bearing icons or candles. The procession begins at the icon corner,
proceeds through the entire dwelling, and returns to the icon corner.
The hand
censer, charcoal (for burning the incense) and the incense may be purchased at
some parish churches or from monastic communities such as Holy Transfiguration
Monastery (Brookline, Massachusetts 02146). The parish priest or deacon would
be happy to show parishioners how to light the charcoal and offer incense.
The
charcoal and incense ashes should not be discarded in the garbage, but should
be put along the foundation of the building, buried in the ground or put in
some other appropriate place where no one will step on them.
Feast
days are celebrated by Orthodox families as special and joyous occasions. These
days are not regarded as normal days and for this reason Orthodox homes often
are decorated especially for the feast. The decorating of the home and icon
corner can be a project for the parents together with the children. The
decorations themselves, the decorating, and the blessing of the house with the
hand censer, all place emphasis on the specialness and the importance of the feast.
These are not to be surpassed by any secular celebrations at home, for after
all, the Orthodox home is a family church and God is at the center of its
existence. There is nothing so empty as a Christmas celebrated, as many
westerners do, so that the house decorations, the meal, the gifts, or the
family get-together are the center and reason for the celebration. In other
words, Christ has been made alien to the celebration" (Marriage and the
Christian Home, by Fr. Michael B. Henning)
I also
found the following:
"For
country folk the farming cycle is closely connected with the Church Year,
indicating when to sow certain crops, etc. There are various blessings of crops
and produce, of cattle and the like, so that everything is related to God. Even
townsfolk keep up such traditions as eating homemade pastry birds on the feast
of the Forty Holy Martyrs (9th / 22nd March), taking care that only the most
essential work is done on St Elias' day, blessing the house with holy water on
the first day of every month, and censing each day with a home-censer and
incense. Whenever possible, Orthodox people try to attend church not only on
Sundays, but for the main feasts, even keeping children off school for
this" (The Orthodox Way of Life, by a Nun Abroad, From The Shepherd, Vol.
XVII, No. 3 (December 1996)).
By Fr. John Whiteford
Source: http://fatherjohn.blogspot.com.by/2017/11/stump-priest-censing-at-home.html
Why Orthodox Christians have a Closed Communion Table?
One of my
biggest struggles on my journey into Orthodoxy was the closed communion
table. It seemed quite unfair that
someone else could deem who was worthy to take communion, and who was not. Infants and children in the Church could
partake of it, but I as a Christian and inquirer into Orthodoxy could not.
But I
eventually learned that the idea that the communion table should be open to
anyone who wants to partake is actually a very modern concept.
Communion in America in the 1700’s and 1800’s
I own a
two volume Baptist Encyclopedia set that was published in the 1800’s. I find it
interesting because I can see just how much the faith of mainline
churches has evolved over the past couple of hundred years.
In the
second volume of the Baptist Encyclopedia there are statements of faith, mostly
written in the 1700’s. These were
essentially creeds written in conjunction with most of the ministers in a given
region.
In the
New Hampshire Declaration of Faith, we find the following: “[baptism] is
prerequisite to the privileges of a church relation; and to the Lord’s Supper,
in which the member of the church by the sacred use of bread and wine, are to
commemorate together the dying love of Christ.”
In the
Philadelphia Confession of Faith (adopted by the Baptist Association on Sept
25, 1742), we find a list regarding the purposes of Lord’s Supper in section
XXXII. It includes, “confirmation of the
faith of believers in all of the benefits thereof.” And it later states in part 8 of section
XXXII, “All ignorant and ungodly persons, as they are unfit to enjoy communion
with Christ, so are they unworthy of the Lord’s table and cannot…partake of
these holy mysteries, or be admitted thereunto.”
In
summary: before the 20th century, baptism was a sign that one accepted the
teachings of a church. It was also a
strict prerequisite to partaking in the Lord’s Supper. Communion was not a right one could demand,
but rather a privilege of church membership.
Communion in the first centuries of the
church to today
There was
a brilliant Christian writer who lived during the 100’s (second century). His name was Justin Martyr and he left us
many valuable writings that historians frequently use in order to understand
the life and teachings of the early church.
In chapter LXVI of Justin’s First Apology, he explains the requirements
for communion saying,
“And this
food is called among us the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake
but the person who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who
has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins…and who is
so living as Christ has enjoined.”
I find it
interesting that up until the 20th century, there were three commonly accepted
requirements for a person to take communion within a church, whether Orthodox,
Roman Catholic, or Baptist. They were:
1. A Trinitarian baptism.
2. A confirmation that one has accepted the
beliefs and teachings of that particular church.
3. A life that is marked by morality (in other
words, you were actually expected to change your behavior to conform with the
teachings of Christ when you became a believer).
With faith and love come forward
When I
enter into an Orthodox Church and want them to change their ways, I am not only
displaying my historical ignorance, but I am unconsciously stating that church
is all about me and what I want. For
nearly 2,000 years, most if not all churches had what would nowadays be deemed
a “closed communion table.”
Partaking
of communion within a church body has - until modern times - been an assent that
you have come to a place of agreement with their teachings. At every liturgy, the priest holds the
communion cup before the congregation and extends the invitation, “In the fear
of God, with faith and with love come forward.”
That statement is packed with implications, but here is the gist of the
requirements:
1. One must approach the altar with a respectful
fear and awe of God.
2. One must agree to the faith a.k.a. the
teachings of the Orthodox Church.
3. One must have love for God and for his
brothers and sisters. The fathers of the
church teach that if you have something against your brother, you are to leave
the altar and go make amends with that person.
Only when we have unity amongst ourselves can we be unified to Christ..
Concluding Thoughts
If you,
like me, have struggled with the idea of having a closed communion table, then
I would say that firstly you are not alone.
I have no desire to make someone feel guilty for thinking that way nor
am I condemning those who have a very open practice in their church.
A closed
table is thought to be unloving and unwelcoming in today’s church culture. I sometimes feel that pressure to be socially
acceptable has diluted the meaning of certain foundations of the Christian
faith. It is important that we
understand that an open table is a very unusual and modern concept when you
consider the church as a whole. Even the
Baptist churches of a couple hundred years ago had closed tables.
I hope
this research helps others as it helped me to take off my modern, Western
glasses and see things in a more historical light. The Orthodox are generally loving people and
mean no disrespect, so please don’t take offense when they don’t allow you to partake
of communion. They simply have a very
high view of the teachings and traditions of the early church.
Source: http://www.orthodoxroad.com/why-a-closed-communion-table/
A Baptism on the way from Minsk to St. Petersburg
It’s nice to
dream about something to the sound of train wheels. For example, to dream about
the beginning of summer holidays, or about a trip to sea, which the parents
will probably present you. It doesn’t matter what sea exactly. Just so to go to
a resort! All Timotheus’ course mates have already been in Egypt or Turkey,
while the luckiest of them have seen the Arab Emirates. The guy sighed sadly.
He guessed that this time he would have to spend time in the hateful village and
settle for an old bedcover spread near the patch and for drinking kvass,
instead of lying on a deck chair with a sweated glass in his hand. Timotheus
had a little pick at his companion. That's interesting where this man is going. To St. Petersburg probably, where else? He is not going to a remote area in the
countryside, that’s for sure! He is dressed too intelligent for that and
behaves somehow proudly. Timotheus looked at him closer and was surprised to
note that the man’s face was quite young, while his hair were completely grey.
Perhaps, the man noticed his puzzling face because he smiled friendly then:
- My name’s
Anton. Nice to meet you.
Timotheus
extended his hand and said his name. Why not? An easy conversation is the best
way to pass the time. So he was happy to have that unexpected acquaintance,
which could brighten up his three-hour-long road.
- Where are you
going? – the guy asked.
- To Orsha. I
have a very important business there.
- Me too, -
Timotheus said with tragic voice. – My grandmother got sick. I’m going there to
visit her and help her with the household. She lives in Svistelki village. It
lies one and a half kilometer far from the city.
The guy looked
at Anton and asked suddenly:
- What business do you have there?
Of course, one
should not act like this. The question sounded too rough. However, Timotheus
wanted to learn as much as possible about his companion. The man seemed strange. One
can even say mysterious.
- Well then. I’ll
tell if you're interested, - Anton said calmly. – Every year I visit my friend
in Minsk and then I go to Kuteinsky Epiphany Monastery on the feast of the
Baptism of the Lord. It's tradition, friend.
Timotheus
looked at Anton distrustfully. Can he be faithful? Doesn’t look like that. He
seems quite respectable. The guy could not cope with his curiosity:
- Why should
you come from other country to this monastery?
Anton looked at
him with a smile:
- You want to
hear the whole story? From the very beginning?
Is he joking? Tough
to tell… Timotheus decided to nod, just in case.
- All right, -
Anton said lightly, - listen…
I was drafted
into the army. When I left, I had a fiancee. When I came back, she was already
married to another man. My heart was heavy but there was nothing I could
do. I tried to rebuild my life but nothing worked out. I had a job but it was
not interesting for me. I met other girls but my heart did not respond. And
then, Timotheus, I got bored. So bored that I understood: I don’t want to live.
Just do not want to live. I didn’t see any sense in it. Today people call it depression. In fact, most often such a condition is
absolutely normal for secular people. If you live without God, there is no sense in such life. You
can’t trick your heart… There is no entertainment that can bring you joy, if there
is a whole inside of you.
Anton looked in
the window and continued with his plain voice:
- I decided to
serve contract. Honestly speaking, there was no heroism in this decision. I
just looked for a way to justify my senseless existence… And that was how I
got in the “second” war in Chechnya.
Timotheus felt
uncomfortable. He didn’t want to listen to anymore. Something inside of him resisted.
However, Anton couldn’t know about that:
- There were
four Belarusians in my squad. Most of the people were from the Ural regions. You know,
before I got there I misunderstood the meaning of friendship. However, when
bullets are flying over your head, everything sets in its place. You begin to understand
rather clearly, what it means to love, to be a friend, to be loyal. On the top of all, my friend, I really wanted to come back home, to my old parents! Although
I was absolutely unfaithful person, I began to pray: “God, help me come back
home alive, I have so much to do for my parents!” Can you imagine this? I wasn’t
even baptized but still I prayed with tears in my eyes and felt: Someone
heard me!
Anton caught
his breath and looked in Timotheus’ eyes:
- One man from
Minsk, Sasha, got me out from under the burning car and carried me for more than ten kilometers to our block post. There is no need for you to know the
details but the main thing was that I really managed to come back home. Alive. I
wanted very much to thank God for that but I didn’t know how to do that. I
thought that all those visits to church are pure hypocrisy. The main thing is
to have the Lord in your heart. I prayed with my own words, I didn’t accept any
literature and didn’t want to be baptized. Why should I? God knows I believe in Him. Several
months later, I decided to visit Sasha. I figured out the route, bought the
tickets and went on the road. I spent several days with my friend and had to go
home. I was sitting in the train car already, when I felt strange anxiety. The longer
I was on the way, the worse I felt. I can’t even explain now, what that was. I felt
that I was missing something important in my life… You know what I did then?
- What? –
Timothy asked.
- I just got
out of the train, when it made a stop in Orsha. I was walking across the city
with a gym bag on my shoulder without any idea about where and why I was
going. I thought that I was just insane. Then I saw the domes of a church. You
can’t imagine how hard my heart began to beat in my chest. I ran to the church.
I came in and saw that the service was served. I stood for a while and realized that it was a feast day. I don’t remember who was standing beside me. A
brother from the monastery, I guess. I asked him what the reason of all that
solemnity was. “The Baptism of the Lord!” – He answered. I was so scared of
those words. I thought: “How can it be the Baptism?! Why has Christ to be
baptized?! He is God after all!” I knew nothing about the Orthodox faith. I
just contrived a suitable religion for myself and was satisfied with it. So I had
questions. Later I decided to come to a priest. We were talking for quite long…
Finally, I spent there two weeks and went home being baptized. And now I am
Antony, the servant of God. That’s it, pal. That was the biggest miracle in my
life. Just think about it: I was literally led by hand to a foreign city, to a foreign
church exactly on that feast day! Not just to a church, but to Epiphany
Monastery! Since then I come here every year. This is my birth place…
- Are you bored
with your life now?
Anton said
firmly:
- No. Now I
know what for I’ve come in this world.
On the train station,
they said goodbye to each other just like old friends. Anton headed to
monastery with light steps, while Timothy was going wistfully to the bus
station.
Less than in an
hour his grandmother will look at him excitingly:
- Why are you
so sad? Aren’t you sick?
Timothy will
hug her and persuade her that everything is fine. And then he will ask her:
- Was I really
baptized, grandma?
January 19,
2018
St. Elisabeth
Convent
Excerpts from Sermons: Salvation is a Question of Relationships...
The Church is our life. It is our opportunity to live
mindfully and to be fully human. A human being as an image of God can only
exist in the Church. When we lose connection to the Church, the Divine
principle in us starts to wear off. The Lord created humans with a potential and
a calling to dwell in the paradise as the image and the likeness of God.
However, a person who leaves God and severs his ties with God, loses that
paradise. Adam and Eve lost the paradise, and we are also riddled with
passions, instability, and incompleteness, but regardless of all that, being as
we are in the Church, in the relationship with God, in prayer, we are in the
blissful paradise. (Sermon after the Divine Liturgy in the
Boarding Home on October 20, 2017)
If we get
accustomed to talking with God, He will reign inside us, and this will be the
fellowship that will deliver righteous words, righteous thoughts, and righteous
actions. It is impossible to accomplish all that without God. It appears to us
that we do the right things, more or less, but it’s vague and prone to
momentary change. Only the aspects that are tied to God — his blessing, his
actions — are eternal. (Sermon before the Confession in the Boarding
Home for Children with Special Needs on October 20, 2017)
The
Israelites left Egypt to reach the Promised Land. Everything that happened with
them on their way (manna, etc.) was just a means for them to pull through. We
should also direct our efforts towards moving closer to God. The desert of our
hearts is, perhaps, as big and dry as the desert that the Israelites had to
cross. We may hope that there are fresh water fountains somewhere in that
desert but it’s an illusion. A human being does not possess the fountain of
life. God is the only life-giving fountain. When we partake of the Holy
Eucharist, we are filled with grace that allows us to keep thinking and
functioning. (Sermon after the Divine Liturgy in the
Boarding Home for Children with Special Needs on March 4, 2017)
If you
evaluate someone, you will always come to judge him or her. Horses sometimes wear blinkers that keep them
from freaking out if they see something unexpected. We don’t have blinkers,
that’s why we jump at shadows. One must make his own blinkers and stop judging
others. It does not mean that we must ignore everything that’s happening around
us. Saints used to see more than we are capable of. They saw farther and deeper
than we do. They were aware of the fact that humans are prone to sinning;
however, they also knew that sins may go away, and the former sinners would
then become holy. (Sermon after the Divine Liturgy in the
Boarding Home for Children with Special Needs on October 21, 2017)
There are
wonderful and profound words in one of the Old Testament books, “Can a woman
forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her
womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee” (Isaiah 49:15). This is
what the Lord says through one of his prophets. We are the New Israel, and we
know that the God of Christians is the God who does not simply accept our love
and adoration. Our love is, in fact, a reflection — a reaction — to his care
about us. The God of Christians is different from the gods worshiped by pagans
in that He sacrifices himself so that every one of us will not perish but will
have everlasting life. (Sermon after the All-Night Vigil on October
10, 2017)
By Fr. Demetrius Basalygo
I was
visiting the boarding home for the mentally challenged, and there was a patient
who basically managed to express the entire experience of the fallen world and
the fallen human being. When they called him to have him anointed with holy oil
and sprinkled with holy water, he declared, “They do them, I do me, God does
him.” These dreadful words are the essence of what happened during the Fall,
when everyone and everything was separated and fell apart. That’s the way of
death. The Lord, however, came to re-unite us. He came to restore the unity
among us and with himself, so that we could have eternal life through this
unity. This is the crux of what the Church offers us. Salvation is a question of relationships, a question pertaining to the unity of life. (Sermon
after the Divine Liturgy on October 13, 2017)
The Devil is very crafty: he can lead an individual astray
little by little, so that the person loses the track of salvation without even
noticing it. Sometimes, it seems to us that rules are inviolable. Of course,
rules are rules, but there is the letter of the Law, and there is the Spirit.
So if we go by the letter of the law, we can assume that we should take
everything literally. How do you interpret the letters of the law? Are you sure
that you understand what they really mean? More often than not, people use
their own reasoning, their logical faculty, to discern the truth, as if their
logical thinking is the criterion of truth. That’s a delusion. This is why one
should be humble and obey more experienced and knowledgeable members of the
Church. Don’t be so arrogant as to think that you are able to determine what is
right and what is wrong. The Spirit is recognised by spirit, not reason. The
spirit of love lives in one’s heart. By this, I mean the innermost of one’s
heart, not its emotional aspect. (Sermon after the Divine Liturgy on September
19, 2017)
January 11, 2018
St.
Elisabeth Convent
An Orthodox Christian Approach to Sickness: Why Do We Get Sick?
Sickness
is a phenomenon of our existence on earth that is familiar to everyone. What is
sickness? Why do we get sick? How do we get rid of it?
Speaking
of theological approach to this phenomenon, we must be aware of the fact that
sickness is nothing other than a decrease in natural human vigor, a discord in
his essence, and a change of some sort in his composition, which was created by
God. The human was called from non-existence into being by the Divine Love, and
he was created perfect. Therefore, there was no place for sickness in his body.
However,
when humans transgressed God’s will and trespassed the commandment given to
them by their Creator, their sinful actions introduced a distortion into the
world, and their nature underwent a transformation that can be most aptly
characterized with the word “corruption”, i.e., a rift, a discord. This
corruption resulted in sicknesses and suffering. Therefore, sicknesses and
bodily weaknesses result from the Fall. It is by no means a coincidence that
both bodily suffering and sinful habits of one’s soul are called “passions”.
This is
how we can explain the spiritual mechanism of sickness more easily, and give an
answer to the question, “Why do we get sick?” When a person voluntarily chooses
to trespass God’s commandments and turns his back on the Lord who is the Source
of all life, he gets on a different track. As he moves along this track, which
leads to dying, he will inevitably encounter sicknesses, sorrows, and ailments
that are the harbingers of death.
Sickness
is always caused by sin. Sometimes you can figure out the spiritual cause of
your sickness simply by looking into your own heart. On the contrary, sometimes
you will have to inspect your entire life and investigate your conscience
meticulously in order to find out why you suffer from a certain sickness. It is
in your own actions that you will be able to see the real spiritual cause of
your health condition: an un-confessed and un-repented sin that, like a morbid
scab, causes the sickness of the soul which in turn, in compliance with the
unbreakable law of interconnectedness of soul and body, leads to bodily
infirmity.
A
sickness, allowed by God’s Providence, is nothing other than a means to teach a
person who defected from God’s Truth. This is how C. S. Lewis, a
British author and religious thinker, treats suffering. His thoughts about it
are remarkably concise: “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our
consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf
world.”
Anyway,
if the root of one’s sickness lies in the sin, one must direct his efforts to
take that root out first. We Orthodox Christians can and should use medicines
and seek doctors’ advice; nevertheless, we must never neglect spiritual
treatments, i.e., the Sacraments of Confession and Communion, the Sacrament of
Unction, and first of all, prayer to the Lord and his saints.
By Archpriest Andrew Nikolaidi
Source:
www.dishupravoslaviem.ru
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